Whist on annual leave during the summer holidays, we take the kids out to the countryside. It is a beautiful day and we decide to stop and have a few drinks and lunch in a pub.

While my seventeen-year-old daughter is very sociable and quite happy to sit in a pub garden enjoying the sunshine, my twelve-year-old son isn’t. He is autistic and actively avoids social situations, even with family, and hates to have his routine disrupted.

However, we have found that as long as he has access to his games through his phone or tablet he will stay relatively happy as he can zone out.

My wife, daughter, and I sit in a picnic-type pub while table my son plonks himself on a bench nearby and proceeds to play his games. We have been sat in the pub garden for an hour or so when a couple of women come into the garden with three children and sit themselves in the shade next to the pub. No biggie, as we are at the top (sunny) end of the garden.

After about twenty minutes, the mother of the three children approaches my son.

Woman: *Demanding tone* “Are you playing online? My son cannot access the pub Wi-Fi.”

The signal is poor in the garden area.

Son: *Nervously* “Yes.”

He holds up the mobile Wi-Fi device he is using.

Woman: “What’s that?”

I respond as my son is now showing signs of elevated anxiety.

Me: “It’s a mobile Wi-Fi device so he can play his games.”

Woman: “How do I connect to it? My son needs to play his games!”

Me: “I’m afraid you can’t. There is limited data on it and it is for my son’s use.”

Woman: “But my son can’t play his games.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but that’s not my problem.”

Woman: “But why should your son be able to play his games and not my son?”

Daughter: “Because we brought a mobile device and you didn’t.”

Gotta love my daughter!

Me: “As I said, it’s for my son’s use and there is limited data on it. End of.”

The woman then stomps back to her table in a huff and we think nothing more of it. 

I have to point out that even if she had asked politely, I would have still said no as the range on the thing is pretty poor which meant her son would have had to sit near my son to use it. This would have only raised my son’s anxiety levels and he would not have been happy.

About ten minutes later, she shouts across the garden in a rather jubilant tone.

Woman: “Ha! I’ve managed to connect to your device!”

Me: “I doubt that, since you haven’t got the password.”

Woman: “I don’t need it; I have put my own in.”

I’m like, “Whatever; there’s no way she connected to it.” We carry on chatting for another hour before getting up to leave. As we pass her table, she demands to know.

Woman: “Why is your service provider charging me for data?”

Me: “They’re not; you were never connected to my device.”

Woman: “Yes, they are… look!”

She thrusts her phone in my face.

Me: “I’m not with [Provider]… but I assume you are?”

I do not stay any longer and am not prepared to “discuss” the situation with her.

Daughter: “She probably selected personal hotspot option, thinking it was our device, from her own device but there was not enough data available. When she entered her password it was to purchase additional data!”

Related:
Not So Hot On The Hotspot

When moving to my new apartment, I am also going to change from satellite to cable TV. This means my old router does not meet my new requirements, so I decide to take advantage of a promotion and get the to-rent model of my new ISP for free, as I’m too lazy to get a newer router myself, despite being a general IT and network admin at work.

After moving, I plug in the company-provided router, connect my main computer, and set everything up, which just works fine. I take a look at the manual, which says I have to connect the cable from the socket to a three-way switch/converter; one outgoing cable connects to the phone, one cable to the router, and the last cable to the TV. Despite the cable between the switch and TV, there is a regular ethernet cable that connects the TV and the router. I install all that and check on my PC and my notebook; Wi-Fi and Internet work.

To my confusion, in the following days, the Internet randomly stops working, so I do the usual troubleshooting and figure out that I cannot even connect to the router from my wired PC, as the settings seemed to have changed. Everything starts to work again later that day.

As I can’t figure out why and can’t find anything online, I call tech support.

Support: “[Company Support], how can I help you?”

Me: “Hi. I’m having trouble with your router, which seems to randomly stops working.”

I give them detailed information about the problem, all the steps I’ve taken, and the data I’ve collected.

The employee seems to ignore all I just said.

Support: “Okay, well, let’s see… Did you check whether the router is properly plugged in and the lights are all on?”

Me: “Yes. As I said, having worked IT myself, I already did basic troubleshooting, which did not work, and then…”

I give all my taken steps and collected data again.

Support: “So, hmph, well…”

There’s a very awkward long pause.

Me: “Did you have any reports about similar issues? Or any idea as to why my network settings seem to change and even change back to the correct settings later?”

Support: “Ah, network settings? I’m sorry, sir, I can’t quite follow you?”

Me: “Well, I already checked…” 

I give my results a third time.

Support: “I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know what all that is supposed to mean. But my scheme tells me to ask you to restart the router, please.”

Me: “Okay, so do you have any deeper knowledge of network configuration and your [brand router]? If not, I would like to talk to some tech person who is able to do more than read from some paper.”

Support: “I’m very sorry, but there is no one in our call center who is qualified for much more than our standard spiel given by the company.”

Me: “I see. So, is there any way you might set me up with someone who can help me?”

Support: “Again, I’m very sorry. All I could do is to set you up with an appointment with an external service, who will send someone to your house.”

Me: “Well, I guess I have to, eh?”

I get the typical appointment which is like: sometime between rise and dawn, better take the whole week off, just to be sure.

The cable guy arrives around noon without any info or documentation, so I tell him what’s wrong.

He speaks without even looking at my setup.

Cable Guy: “You followed the instructions and connected the switch with your TV, didn’t you?”

Me: “Yes, of course. That’s why the instructions were printed?”

Cable Guy: “Well, yeah, unfortunately, the instructions in this case are wrong. See, the cable from that switch to the TV is configured in such a way that your TV is supposed to work as a second router. Therefore, your settings on the real router get overridden; for some crazy reasons, the TV’s network settings are given priority. Please don’t ask me why; it’s crazy. So, if you turn on your TV, and later on your PC the settings won’t work, if you do it the other way round you stay connected with the router and everything is fine.”

The cable guy simply pulls out the cable between the switch and the TV.

Cable Guy: “There you go. That’s it.”

Me: “Your kidding, right?”

Cable Guy: “Nope, that’s it.”

Me: “Oh, good God, and nobody on the tech support line is able to give that information?”

Cable Guy: “Seems like that, huh? That’s what happens when you try to outsource everything possible. And it happens so often, I have done this fix seven times already today.”

Me: “Well, sounds like time for a break. Come on. I know some nice and fast Italian around the corner; I’ll buy us some pizza.”

Needless to say, I canceled the contract shortly after and am already looking for my new ISP in a few months, hopefully without such utter nonsense.

There is a computer work station in our store for customers to use. We put it in because our store policy does not allow us to access things like a customer’s email from our department computer, for security reasons. This happens roughly once a week.

Customer: “How do I get to my email from this computer?”

Me: “Well, you just go to your email provider’s site and log in, like on a normal computer.”

The customer begins to type in the “search” bar, which is on the store homepage and will just search the store inventory.

Me: “No, no, in the URL bar, here.”

Customer: “Oh!”

The customer begins to type [email]@[website] into the URL bar.

Me: “No, you have to go to the site.”

Customer: “What?”

Me: “Here… Type in [website] right there.”

Customer: “Okay… What now?”

Me: “Now you log in.”

Customer: “How?”

Me: “With your username and password.”

Customer: “I don’t know those!”

And this is what happens when people only ever access their email through their phones.

Me: “Guest services, how may I help you?”

The guest calling is clearly a confused elderly woman.

Guest: “Yes, hello. I have blinking words flashing on my TV screen, and I can’t watch my shows with those on there. Can you take them off?”

Me: “Yes, those are your subtitles. You just have to press a button on your remote that will either say ‘Sub-T,’ or, ‘CC.’ They will turn your subtitles off.”

After a long pause:

Me: “Were you able to find it on your remote?”

Guest: “No, my remote only says, ‘Volume,’ ‘Flash,’ and, ‘Redial.’”

Me: “Ma’am, that is your phone. You have to use your remote.”

I ended up having to send our maintenance guy up to help her out.

Related:
Not Even Remotely Close, Part 4
Not Even Remotely Close, Part 3
Not Even Remotely Close, Part 2
Not Even Remotely Close

Caller: “Oh, how do I submit the request for reimbursement through my smartphone?”

Me: “You can do it right through our mobile app.”

Caller: “Is that a form?”

Me: “Nope, it’s an app.”

Caller: “Yeah, is that a form?”

Me: “No, it’s an application through your smartphone”

Caller: “I don’t have that application.”

Me: “Well, no, you would have to download it through your app store. Are you sure you have a smartphone?”

Caller: “Oh, I guess not. I have an iPhone.”

Me: “That is a smartphone.” 

I then proceeded to explain what an app was and how to use apps through her phone.

Related:
Not-So-Smart-Phone, Part 39
Not-So-Smart-Phone, Part 38
Not-So-Smart-Phone, Part 37
Not-So-Smart-Phone, Part 36
Not-So-Smart-Phone, Part 35